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theodp (442580) writes "The Internet's Own Boy, the documentary about the life and death of Aaron Swartz, was appropriately released on the net as well as in theaters this weekend, and is getting good reviews from critics and audiences. Which is kind of remarkable, since the Achilles' heel of this documentary, as critic Matt Pais notes in his review, is that "everyone on the other side of this story, from the government officials who advocated for Swartz's prosecution to Swartz's former Reddit colleagues to folks at MIT, declined participation in the film." Still, writer/director Brian Knappenberger manages to deliver a compelling story, combining interesting footage with interviews from Swartz's parents, brothers, girlfriends, and others from his Internet projects/activism who go through the stages of joy, grief, anger, and hope that one sees from loved ones at a wake. "This remains an important David vs. Goliath story," concludes Pais, "of a remarkable brain years ahead of his age with the courage and will to fight Congress-and a system built to impede, rather than encourage, progress and common sense. The Internet's Own Boy will upset you. As it should." And Quinn Norton, who inadvertently gave the film its title ("He was the Internet's own boy," Quinn said after Swartz's death, "and the old world killed him."), offers some words of advice for documentary viewers: "Your ass will be in a seat watching a movie. When it is done, get up, and do something.""

First, I agree that the data should have been free. I even agree that the investigation into him seemed to be heavy handed.

However, Schwartz made an odd and poor choice in getting to the data. He could have downloaded the data from his own desk in his own office. Instead he went to the library and entered a wiring closet that was clearly not supposed to be open to the public. If he wanted to further his cause, this was a poor choice.

He made bad choices, and then reacted extremely badly to the rather predictable consequences. I'm not sure he's much of a poster boy for anything much. It's sad, but I'm not sure what exactly we're supposed to be celebrating here.

He made bad choices, and then reacted extremely badly to the rather predictable consequences. I'm not sure he's much of a poster boy for anything much. It's sad, but I'm not sure what exactly we're supposed to be celebrating here.

Sadly. I agree. He was certainly smart enough to be aware of the consequences of getting caught and of the precedent the Feds have set in similar cases regarding punishment.

Just want to chime in as another vote here. I think it's a very vocal minority that make Aaron Schwartz into the poster boy he is. It helps his case that he was well known personally by a lot of prominent bloggers. I think many of the supporters are too closely connected to him to look at the situation in an objective manner. I don't really blame them. I'd probably be doing something similar if one of my friends had something similar happen to them.

Celebrate that you are alive. But then, I don't see where anyone else is suggestion celebration is called for. Aaron Swartz took his own life, which is a bit more than sad if you knew him. Maybe if your only knowledge of him is posthumous knowledge of his work on Reddit and w/e else, perhaps just a bit of sadness is an appropriate response, but I kind of doubt it. He was threatened with remarkable consequences by, among others, an organization that was apparently not able to keep it's infrastructure secu

Because he killed himself because of broken IP laws. You just don't get it, do you? If the laws weren't in place he'd be alive today. It's the **AA that is keeping people like Aaron repressed for their profits.

While I do feel sorry for what happened to him.. He didn't kill himself because of broken IP laws.. he killed himself because of a mental state that seemed to preclude any option other than suicide. If he had utilized freely and easily obtainable mental health resources(*) he probably would still be alive today.

.. he killed himself because of a mental state that seemed to preclude any option other than suicide.

He was bullied into suicide by believable threats of a 50yr prison sentence from authority, just as surely as that 13yr girl was bullied into suicide by a grown woman on facebook a few years ago. The authorities did everything they could to hang that woman even using facebook terms of services against her, and so they should, it is after all their job. But where are the rabid prosecutors that are taking Swartz's tormentors to task? Why have the authorities not pulled out every trick in the book to hang thos

First, that 13 year old girl was bullied on My Space, not Facebook. Prosecutors tried to go after her, but ultimately she was acquitted of the main felony charge anyway. So maybe nobody is going after the "bullies" in this case because they know better. If they can't even get a 3-year sentence to stick on an "uneducated, immature soccer mom", what chance do they have against high ranking officials that will be even harder to pin down anyway? Seems like a good call to me.

So you liked not prosecuting bank executives because "high ranking officials... will be even harder to pin down"? That was the line of reasoning used in the AG's office for not doing that. You want to give the powerful a pass because it's inefficient to prosecute them? But the rest of us? We're fair game? What a dick.

If they can't even get a 3-year sentence to stick on an "uneducated, immature soccer mom", what chance do they have against high ranking officials that will be even harder to pin down anyway?

You nailed the issue on the head. The only solution to this is to guard your data and not allow government intrusion into people's lives. It may be legal to bully people to suicide or make them mad enough to break the law but the real issue is the ability of the government or any other corporate force to have easy access to one's Facebook, or cellphone data. This is why guarding your data is extremely important, to ward off against these kind of abuses. I think Aaron might have still been alive if the

He was bullied into suicide by believable threats of a 50yr prison sentence from authority

... You really believe that? You need mental help as well. There are FAR worse things than the threat of jail time, even 50 years. He had mental issues. There is no other reason to commit suicide. He also was a criminal with criminal intent in every action he took.

He's not a hero, he's a sad mental case. What he did was wrong. Period. End of story. The fact that he killed himself because he couldn't deal with the consequences of his actions doesn't magically make him a hero nor does it make what he

Regardless of his motives, him killing himself has absolutely nothing to do with IP law. He was mentally unfit for this life. There are plenty of people facing prosecution for doing what they believe to be right. I am tired of hearing about how his death was anything but selfish. The kid was unstable and that is unfortunate, because he gave a lot to the community. We can appreciate his life and accomplishments without fantasizing that the government murdered him for his righteous acts.

My brother has some serious mental health issues, they are not free nor easy to obtain at reduced costs. Think of how long doctor visits are, that's how long we waited for each of his appointments, and it's a very slow process.

Think of it like trying to treat any other prolonged illness. Free options take up more of your time, have a whole slew of problems tacked in, etc. It's free or extremely cheap, but with trade offs like I mentioned.

The point Threni made still stands though, why was his treatment so ro

While the famous quote is personifying information by implying will, I believe that the statement is effectively true. Nature has no free will, so it is not really true that "Something there is does not like a wall ", but entropy clearly demands that they fall and it looks to me like entropy wants information to be free, as well. It takes a great deal of effort to keep information captive, but almost no effort to release it.

People, on the other hand, purportedly want to be free. It takes serious effort to remain free. And, looking at support by the general public for "Big Brother" government (as long as it keeps us safe), it is not clear that most people even want to be free.:Or, perhaps they (or I) fail to understand what freedom really is.

The meme "information wants to be free" is supposed to be read like "water wants to flow downhill". That statement does not mean water has a mind and actively thinks about flowing downhill. It also does not mean dams to stop the downhill movement are immoral or wrong. What it is saying is "a dam is expensive and will not magically appear without active input by a concerned party".

Series of bad choices? The main one is making the public domain articles in JSTOR available on the Internet instead of having to pay a dime a page for a copy (yes, PUBLIC DOMAIN). It was the government calling that a Terms of Service violation and thus "wire fraud" which is a felony under the Computer Fraud and Abuse Act (a horribly loose law that lifts wording directly from the Espionage Act of 1917, which itself is possibly the worst piece of legislation on the books). According to the CFAA, using the int

The same people who say that Aaron Swartz made a series of bad choices culminating in the worst possible choice also seem to claim that Edward Snowden should have chosen death (and martyrdom) over seeking asylum in Russia (completely ignoring the fact that the revocation of his passport made any travel plans he had tricky at best, leaving him with little choice but to maybe adopt the lifestyle the character portrayed by Tom Hanks had in 'The Terminal' if he chose not to seek asylum in Russia). Talk about do

It's not for-profit logic. Copyright exists for a legitimate reason, to provide some incentive for people to create things and to distribute them, both of which have real costs in time and effort. That's why it's been around for centuries. The fact that copyright law has been perversely lengthened to ridiculous extremes is a big problem that must be fixed, but it doesn't negate the value of having copyright for much shorter terms. Works need to expire to the public domain, otherwise the people who rely on copyright don't have the same incentive to make new stuff, and the public doesn't get anything for granting a temporary copyright monopoly in the first place. Creators just sit on old stuff and milk it forever.

On top of that, JSTOR isn't even a for-profit operation, which means it is a pretty poor example to choose for a principled stand against current copyright law. A principled way to do it would have been to scan in out-of-copyright journals yourself, or maybe ones that would have been out-of-copyright if the terms hadn't been extended ridiculously (e.g., from the 1930s and 1940s), and then put them up on the web for free. Dare the publishers to sue you. It would take a lot of work to set it up. Guess what? It would also cost money. Web space doesn't come for free, especially if high traffic.

Instead Swartz chose the shortcut of downloading JSTOR's scanned-in archive en masse, despite the fact it violated the license terms for access. JSTOR didn't go all RIAA on him, they just wanted the mass downloads to stop, and MIT was obliged by their license to try to make it stop, efforts that Swartz kept circumventing, culminating in him installing a laptop in a non-public networking closet to do so.

Good principle, bad implementation. None of which justifies the tragedy of how the prosecution was carried out or the tragedy of him committing suicide, but that doesn't absolve him from his own bad choices.

Copyright exists for a legitimate reason, to provide some incentive for people to create things and to distribute them, both of which have real costs in time and effort.

A mere pretext to protect established industries from new technologies that reduce the time and effort to create things. Today's developments are nothing new. It has always been the intent of these laws to restrict access to a means of production to an exclusive club, starting with the old writers guilds that initially created this mess when

So, abolish copyright, and you won't complain when people copy every creative work you've ever made and get money delivering it to other people while you get nothing from it? It must be nice to be independently wealthy.

I'm for a *short* copyright period. Really short. A decade or so, but it's negotiable. Not zero. A short term of copyright has nothing to do with powerful industries and long-entrenched cartels, it has to do with an individual putting food on the table. I suppose it would be sufficient

Note that copyright has nothing to do with established industries. When copyright was placed into the Constitution, it was frequently common for authors to self-publish. Copyright protected these authors from unscrupulous printers who might print out a few extra (thousand) copies to sell on the side, or from some individual in another part of the country from grabbing your work and selling it elsewhere. Note that this was mostly on the individual level, since companies that were involved in publishing were

There was a big industry behind copyright when the constitution was being drafted. It wasn't authors, or artists. It was map makers.

Map makers spent a lot of money ensuring that their maps were accurate, and they wanted to ensure that people wouldn't be able to seize their maps and build on them before they made back their initial investments.

On September 12, 2012, federal prosecutors filed a superseding indictment adding nine more felony counts, which increased Swartz's maximum criminal exposure to 50 years of imprisonment and $1 million in fines.[12][84][85] During plea negotiations with Swartz's attorneys, the prosecutors offered to recommend a sentence of six months in a low-security prison, if Swartz would plead guilty to 13 federal crimes. Swartz and his lead attorney rejected that deal, opting instead for a trial in which prosecutors would have been forced to justify their pursuit of Swartz

That is one of the reasons I hate DAs and prosecutors in general. They will pursue charges they know are completely unreasonable compared to the offense for no other reason than scare the hell out of someone making them face their lives being ruined if they attempt to state a case for their innocence in court. They bully people into plea deals every day. This should be illegal. If they are not prosecuting the crime in good faith they have no business representing the publich in such a powerful role.

Bullshit. Threatening "50 years if you make us go to trial, but if you confess we'll recommend six months but the court can still give you 50 years" is still threatening 50 years. The threat of heavy sentences to get people to waive the right to a trail is an egregious violation of due process and the the guarantee against cruel and unusual punishments.

Bullshit. Threatening "50 years if you make us go to trial, but if you confess we'll recommend six months but the court can still give you 50 years" is still threatening 50 years. The threat of heavy sentences to get people to waive the right to a trail is an egregious violation of due process and the the guarantee against cruel and unusual punishments.

If you want to take away the ability for the government to pursue the maximum possible penalty, you should also recommend taking away their discretion to pursue the minimum possible penalty as well. I keep hearing that threatening to pursue the maximum *legal* sentence unless a plea bargain is negotiated is a violation of due process. I don't think anyone who says this actually understands what "due process" even is.

In my opinion, Aaron Swartz's suicide clearly suggests someone that in spite of public app

If you want to take away the ability for the government to pursue the maximum possible penalty, you should also recommend taking away their discretion to pursue the minimum possible penalty as well.

Absolutely. There's no reason why the prosecutor should have any say in sentencing, that's for the judge. And to take that a step further - not only should the prosecutor be unable to pursue the minimum possible penalty, there should be no minimum sentencing in the first place. This is just interference by another route, and worse because the judge can't overrule it even when it's clearly unjust [famm.org] (warning: PDF).

It was his own life, and his choice to live or die. Just because his situation sucked doesn't mean the government killed him. I'm not responding to you here, but I am tired of people acting like he was an innocent victim. He made his bed and didn't want to sleep in it. Fine, his choice. That doesn't mean the result was anything but his own decision.

There are people who've been locked up for decades to crimes they didn't commit who don't commit suicide. There are also many people who did commit crimes who al

Swartz was a tragic, confused (sexually?) figure. If the IP laws were different, maybe he would've found a different cause and done the same thing. As it was, the laws he was protesting don't exactly stir memories of the Montgomery (AL) Bus Boycott. People who have the advantage of a college education (or are on track to get one) might have to fork over $100/yr for a subscription when they shouldn't have to, or else they might have to schlep over to the stacks of a bricks-and-mortar university library l

I'm getting a little tired of the lionization of this guy too. I have to wonder if he would be as celebrated in the media if he weren't so young, charismatic, and good-looking. Hackers get busted all the time for doing much less innocuous stuff, and there are plenty of important cases out there with much more import on tech and privacy issues. But it always seems to be the good-looking young guys whose faces end up splashed all over the media as the hacker heroes.

i have no idea what he looked like (and him being male, i don't care). i followed the story, though - and it seems to me that the ones "getting tired" are those who benefit from the current copy-lack-of-rights state

I don't benefit from IP laws, but I'm tired of hearing about him. There are 38,196 suicides each year in the USA as of 2012, why should this kid stand out(helping with RSS is paltry)? If we're going to get all touchy feely and sad about his suicide - what about those other 38,195 people? Where are their movies? Who is throwing a fit that they aren't with us?

Goes to state of mind, does it not? I don't think for a second he felt that he was looking at getting in too much trouble legally, by what he was doing. Slap on the wrist, pay some fines, maybe probation. Certainly not years, or as the DA threatened, decades behind bars. And that's the crux of it. Where is the balance between reasonable prosecution, acceptable law, and justice? Wherever it is, it certainly wasn't anywhere near this case.

I think in the end, that's something his actions will ultimately spotli

Stop blaming others for his inability to cope with the consequences of his actions.

OK, how about blaming them for such overzealous prosecution of such minor crimes, that it had cost him over $1,000,000 before the trial began. Can we blame them for that? (And fuck only knows how much of the taxpayers' money those clowns spent on their side...)

Much of the data is free and available elsewhere. All the public domain content, in fact is freely accessible.

What JSTOR especially provides, and part of what Aaron was reaping wholesale, was its organization and links, basically the indexing and cross-indexing. _That_ is what makes JSTOR so useful, and what people pay JSTOR for: the breadth and searchability of the data. JSTOR is already a non-profit agency, whose fees are quite reasonable for the service they provide. And Aaron kept _breaking_ parts of JSTOR by downloading too much too fast, and overwhelming the servers.

Activism, or hacktivism, is one thing. Breaking critical research tools for millions of customers worldwide is abuse, and clearly criminal in several ways. I'm afraid that Aaron earned prosecution. The extent of the prosecution seems severe, but as best I can tell, the prosecutors were quite willing to "deal" for a a very low sentence, as long as the deal included a felony conviction. I'm afraid that that haggling over the charges and the sentence is _normal_ for prosecutors.

non-profit is nothing but an advertising term anymore.
If you run a for-profit corporation. Your corporation makes money which it spends to expand and invest and to pay salaries, and you might go home with a million dollar salary.
If you run a non-profit. Your agency makes money which it spends to expand and invest and to pay salaries, and you might go home with a million dollar salary.

" I'm afraid that that haggling over the charges and the sentence is _normal_ for prosecutors."

Which is part of the problem. Prosecutors are under a lot of pressure to get a guilty plea, and often resort to intimidation to secure it. Thus the standard deal: Confess and we promise five years, or fight in court and we'll do our best to lock you up for fifty.

Activism, or hacktivism, is one thing. Breaking critical research tools for millions of customers worldwide is abuse, and clearly criminal in several ways. I'm afraid that Aaron earned prosecution. The extent of the prosecution seems severe, but as best I can tell, the prosecutors were quite willing to "deal" for a a very low sentence, as long as the deal included a felony conviction. I'm afraid that that haggling over the charges and the sentence is _normal_ for prosecutors.

One thing I learned from Wikipedia that I hadn't heard anywhere else is that, a few years earlier, Swartz first downloaded the Library of Congress's "complete bibliographic data set" (whatever that is), then a bit later downloaded millions of public domain court documents from a paywalled system called PACER. The Library of Congress normally charged fees to access the former, and the latter charged users 8 cents per page back then (now it is 10 cents per page up to $3 per document). Despite gaining the attention of the FBI, he didn't get so much as a slap on the wrist for either one.

So we have a couple aspects potentially contributing to what happened. First, Swartz probably felt reassured by his past experiences that, even if caught, he wouldn't get in trouble. Second, he didn't make any friends in the government by pulling his first two stunts, so when federal prosecutors realized they could get him, they went overboard. This is just conjecture, of course, but I wouldn't be surprised if it was true.

What JSTOR especially provides, and part of what Aaron was reaping wholesale, was its organization and links, basically the indexing and cross-indexing. _That_ is what makes JSTOR so useful, and what people pay JSTOR for: the breadth and searchability of the data.

This is not true. All of this existed before JSTOR. For example, the big databases for mathematics back in the day were SilverPlatter and then MathSciNet. JSTOR is just a small evolutionary step above these, which publishers starting using fo

First, I agree that the data should have been free. I even agree that the investigation into him seemed to be heavy handed.

However, Schwartz made an odd and poor choice in getting to the data. He could have downloaded the data from his own desk in his own office. Instead he went to the library and entered a wiring closet that was clearly not supposed to be open to the public. If he wanted to further his cause, this was a poor choice.

Most atrocities start with a seemingly simple mistake made by the victim. That doesn't justify ruining a mans life over what was essentially a pretty tame prank. I did worse than that... far worse... while I was in college and all I got was banned from the lab for a week. Of course, when I did it, downloading a file wasn't a federal crime yet.

Nothing was done to him that has not been done and worse to people caught with a few joints in their pockets.
Almost 1% of americans go to prison, the vast majority for minor non-violent crimes. They are not only threatened with decades in the can, but actually do not have anyone willing to stand behind them and fight it, and did not stand 1/100th the chance that he did.

First, I agree that the data should have been free. I even agree that the investigation into him seemed to be heavy handed.However, Schwartz made an odd and poor choice in getting to the data. He could have downloaded the data from his own desk in his own office. Instead he went to the library and entered a wiring closet that was clearly not supposed to be open to the public.

...at a different institution. He had free access to that database at his desk, but he went to a different school to do his secretly-scrape-the-entire-scholarly-database project.

But that doesn't excuse the government response. The justice department had no reason to act in such a heavy handed manner. They quite clearly wanted to make an example of him and were willing to bend the law to do so.

But the bigger issue here isn't Swartz, it's the fact that this kind of treatment has become common place. Putting a "hacker" in solitary confinement didn't make any sense when they did it to Kevin Mitnik, and it didn't make any sense with Swartz. It's an abuse of power, the tragedy is it took a suicide for people to notice.

It's an abuse of power, the tragedy is it took a suicide for people to notice.

Something I only learned yesterday, Heymann (Ortiz's boss) had done it before a couple of years prior to Swartz--hounded a 16 year-old with heavy-handed charges until the kid put a bullet through his brain.

He could have downloaded the data from his own desk in his own office. Instead he went to the library and entered a wiring closet that was clearly not supposed to be open to the public.

If you were going to download a lot of data, would you choose a node with many hops to the server or just a few? I would pick the one closest to the server.

Nice rationalization, but his first few attempts at scraping the database was by downloading via the MIT wifi network, so it's clear that speed of access wasn't his main objective here. It was only after he was repeatedly blocked from doing that by wireless access (being blocked should have been a clue to him) that he snuck into the closet.

He could have downloaded the data from his own desk in his own office. Instead he went to the library and entered a wiring closet that was clearly not supposed to be open to the public.

If you were going to download a lot of data, would you choose a node with many hops to the server or just a few? I would pick the one closest to the server.

Nice rationalization, but his first few attempts at scraping the database was by downloading via the MIT wifi network, so it's clear that speed of access wasn't his main objective here. It was only after he was repeatedly blocked from doing that by wireless access (being blocked should have been a clue to him) that he snuck into the closet.

OOoooh. Did he sneak in on his belly like a cobra or on tippy-toes like the spy-vs-spy cartoon? Seems like that would just draw undo attention. Or maybe he just walked in, and you are making shit up.

Uh, since you don't seem to know anything about the case, why are you commenting?

Here are the first couple of links from a google search

The Washington Post: Jan 12, 2013 - "When MIT cut off access to its wireless network, Swartz snuck into an MIT network closet and plugged his laptop directly into the campus..."

What Aaron Swartz did at MIT - Daily KosJan 13, 2013 - Between November and December 2010, Aaron Swartz accessed this room...... The closet he snuck his laptop in turned out..."

I suggest that you e-mail the 784,000 web pages that say Aaron Swartz snuck into the closet, and inform them they're using the English language wrong:

They're not using the English language wrong, they're reporting the facts wrong. Just as the mainstream media did for decades in the War on (Some) Drugs, just as they did in the run-up to the invasions of Afghanistan and Iraq, the media is lying and/or negligently passing on the government's story.

The thing that always bothered me about Swartz is why didn't rich benefactors in the tech industry help him not only with his legal issues, but also with his known issues with clinical depression. A strong, vigorous defense team provided by the EFF and getting Swartz psychiatric help could have saved his life.

EFF had already noted, and supported, Aaron's more legitimate political interests, and welcomed his participation in their political activity. I'd be quite curious if their legal staff had reached out to Aaron with help or suggestions already: they certainly agreed with many of his goals.

I used to know Mike Godwin, the EFF's first lawyer who helped win the Steve Jackson case against the Secret Service. I can just picture Mike trying to explain the difference between the la-la land in Aaron's head, and what

1. I went through the process of someone to get legal help for a software case issue when a huge corp was going after them. While I love the EFF, they generally take a case when they think a precedent could be set in favor of their (and generally my) agenda. If Microsoft sues you to make an example, and the law seems pretty clear, the EFF won't help you. As for other stepping in to help with legal fees, based on past articles (haven't seen the doc) apparently part of the issue he was havi

Which is kind of remarkable, since the Achilles' heel of this documentary, as critic Matt Pais notes in his review, is that "everyone on the other side of this story, from the government officials who advocated for Swartz's prosecution to Swartz's former Reddit colleagues to folks at MIT, declined participation in the film."

It seems to be entirely unremarkable that a story told from only one perspective - presumably the one that shows the main "character" in a positive light - should get good reviews.

Tell it from both sides and you risk leaving the audience with unsatisfyingly ambiguous feelings about the whole affair; it's almost as if life isn't black and white!

The remarkable legal part was that the Aaron Swartz "documents" where sealed under a protective order.
DOJ, MIT, JSTOR Seek Anonymity In Swartz Case:
Recall http://yro-beta.slashdot.org/s... [slashdot.org]

And people ask me why I say we're not in any way more free than any other dictatorship. "But we have free speech!" Yeah. But as soon as someone would listen, rest assured that we'll find a way to hang you.

Or get you to hang yourself, for all we care.

"But we can have guns!" So? The laws are rigged to ensure the government has the bigger ones AND the media power to ensure you're smeared as the bad guy enough that everyone supports that artillery strike against your cute little fortress.

That doesn't mean we shouldn't raise holy hell when the government does something wrong, but to compare the USA to a dictatorship just makes it clear you're just utterly ignorant of the real world.

Almost everywhere, if you obey the rules, you will be just fine. The worst places to be on Earth, if you will not obey every single law, are Seychelles and USA. There are very few states that I can imagine doing what USA did to this boy.

Also, the "real world" is not CNN. United States doesn't even make top ten on well being or life expectancy.

Just because you are content with getting to consume more than everyone else on the planet doesn't mean you are not living under an oppressive regime.

There is actually rather little difference. As long as you don't pose a threat to the state you may pretty much do the same in either, and as soon as you become a nuisance in either state they'll find a way to get rid of you.

The US are a bit more subtle than, say, China so it's easier to bullshit people who can't read between the lines, but in the end, what remains is that as soon as you are deemed a threat, some way will be found to get rid of you.

APK, when I see comments like this from people regarding suicides, it tells me immediately that the person making these comments has never felt suicidal. Never been so utterly and completely depressed that death seems the better option at the time. You simply cannot understand this if you have never experienced the feeling.

The tragedy is that many who do don't make it through the experience. I am glad that I didn't go through with it at that point in my life when it seemed the best option... Although, to be honest, it was really only further self-doubt that delayed taking the final plunge long enough for things to start to turn around.

It is a tragedy that Aaron Shwartz didn't make it through for things to start getting better, but there is certainly blame to be shared in his case... We ALL, as a society as a whole, failed Aaron imo.

APK, when I see comments like this from people regarding suicides, it tells me immediately that the person making these comments has never felt suicidal. Never been so utterly and completely depressed that death seems the better option at the time. You simply cannot understand this if you have never experienced the feeling.

The tragedy is that many who do don't make it through the experience. I am glad that I didn't go through with it at that point in my life when it seemed the best option... Although, to be honest, it was really only further self-doubt that delayed taking the final plunge long enough for things to start to turn around.

It is a tragedy that Aaron Shwartz didn't make it through for things to start getting better, but there is certainly blame to be shared in his case... We ALL, as a society as a whole, failed Aaron imo.

Parent, +1. You can spot someone that has no experience or knowledge of clinical depression a mile away.

Well, NOT answering will pretty much ensure that you'll get the short end of the stick, along with a "and we tried to get them to tell their side but they didn't want to, so obviously they can't refute it".

If you're asked for a comment and you know (or at least suspect) that the interviewer will be unfavorably disposed towards you, ask for WRITTEN questions and that you may answer with a WRITTEN statement. That way you will not only get caught off guard by a question and have to find an answer within second